


Rain, Cleanse My Sins

by masked



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Castiel (Supernatural) Character Study, Established Relationship, Human Castiel, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-06
Updated: 2015-04-06
Packaged: 2019-09-07 00:55:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16843894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/masked/pseuds/masked
Summary: based on dialogue prompt: "We’re in the middle of a thunderstorm and you wanna stop and feel the rain?" + human!Cas.Newly human Castiel takes a refreshing shower under the rain.





	Rain, Cleanse My Sins

**Author's Note:**

> originally posted on April 6, 2015 [here](http://hamburgergod.tumblr.com/post/115646746843/21-because-it-gave-me-humancas-feels).

The downpour is sudden, though Castiel supposes they should’ve suspected it from the way the sky had darkened almost instantly. He hears Dean and Sam cuss as they run for the Impala, but he finds himself unable to move from the spot where he feels the rain beat down at him and soaks him within seconds. The relentless rain stings the side of his face, numb with cold.

It’s all suddenly too much.

“Cas!” Dean bellows through the storm. “C’mon, or we’re leaving without your ass!”

Castiel looks up at the sky, and squeezes his eyes shut. He soon hears the car door slamming, and a hand pulls at him. “Cas?”

He blinks his eyes open, and Dean is in front of him, water streaming down his face. “Dude, come _on_.”

Castiel hasn’t found the words to verbalize how he feels yet, so he just shakes his head in refusal. Dean makes a frustrated sound at the back of his throat. “We’re in the middle of a thunderstorm and you wanna stop and feel the rain?”

“Dean.”

Dean stills, and he examines Castiel before he frowns. “Cas, what’s wrong?”

Castiel looks back up at the murky sky. “I’m wet.”

“Yeah genius, might be ‘cause you’re standing in the middle of a god damn thunderstorm.”

“I’m wet, and I’m cold, and I feel pain so easily, and I—” Castiel blinks away the hot tears. “I’m so— _human_.”

Dean doesn’t say anything, or maybe he doesn’t know what to say, because what _could_ he say to that? It’s likely unfair for Castiel to lay this weight onto him, but it’s as if a dam had burst, and Castiel lets his emotions run his mouth. Another part of being human. “I used to be able to conjure up storms like these, or stop it if I’d wished. I used to be capable of so much more, and now I’m—”

He chokes on his words, and looks at Dean, who looks—forlorn. No, perhaps mournful would be a better word. Mournful of what Castiel has lost, of what he used to be, and he wonders if Dean misses Castiel’s older self too, the more useful species that didn’t stand in the rain and perform useless monologues. 

“I feel miserable right now,” Castiel breathes out. “I didn’t use to feel miserable. I didn’t use to feel _anything_. I used to simply _be_.”

Dean scrubs the water off his face, and sniffles. He takes both of Castiel’s hands in his own, and squeezes. “You telling me you’ve never felt like this when you were an angel, ever?”

Castiel is about to reply no, never, not this intensely, but he thinks he hears an answer within Dean’s question and stops himself. He thinks back to the desperation that led him to drink the entire liquor store after his failure to find God, when he had woken from the haze of power to find out that he’d devastated Heaven and killed so many, when he hid for a year in the land of abomination, away from the man standing in front of him who prayed to him every single night, and later had to push him away again. 

“Perhaps you have a point,” Castiel mutters, watching the way the rain hits the muddy road. Thunder gently rolls in the distance.

Dean wipes a stray strand of hair from Castiel’s forehead. “I’m so fucking sorry, Cas,” he says softly. “I wish we could do something about it.”

Castiel closes his eyes against the touch. He wants to say that maybe he’s always been flawed just as Naomi had told him once, but he doesn’t. It is a flaw, but it’s also what lets him fill up with the different kinds of fondness towards Dean and Sam, and it’s how he’s now able to define it and express it so freely, both internally and externally. 

The summer rain seems a little less cold and relentless now, water trickling down his back and clinging to his body. He still mourns the death of his old self, and he doubts that he’ll ever be able to let of that part of him, but he can’t find himself to regret it as much now, not with the way Dean’s thumb strokes his cheek, and the way the clean crisp smell of rain that calms his senses. 

He may have not given his old self up willingly, but maybe it was inevitable that he’d end up human one way or another. Perhaps he was more human than he’s ever thought himself to be.

The rain doesn’t feel so harsh against his skin anymore.

“Being human is both wonderful and terrifying,” Castiel says quietly. “I don’t know how you do it.”

Dean smiles slightly. “It’s not so bad when you’re born into it.”

Castiel smiles back, wiping the water and tears away from his eyes. “I’m sorry for making you stand in the rain.”

“If I catch a cold, you can be my hot nurse.” Dean grins, and leads him back to the car. 

Castiel watches out the window as they drive past the storm, and rests his eyes against the sound of rain. 


End file.
